NEW YORK—New York City’s official website, www.NYC.gov, is getting some fresh ideas. Teams of developers and Web designers worked all through the weekend to submit their ideas and visions to “Reinvent NYC.gov,” a redesign and reinvention competition, also known as “hackathon.”
The competition was held in the Flatiron District, New York City’s “Silicon Alley,” at General Assembly, a technology and design space that provides space and support services for the tech community. It was a joint initiative between the Mayor’s Office of Media and Entertainment, the Department of Information Technology and Telecommunications (DoITT), and General Assembly.
“I’m absolutely thrilled. I’m just so thankful to all the participants that gave their time, to all the technology partners, to all of individuals across the city of New York that made this possible,” said Chief Digital Officer Rachel Sterne.
The redesign of NYC.gov is part of the Roadmap for the Digital City, an initiative by NYC Digital, in the form of a 62-page report released in the spring that aims to reinvent the way citizens access, view, and use the city’s digital resources.
The competition was held in the Flatiron District, New York City’s “Silicon Alley,” at General Assembly, a technology and design space that provides space and support services for the tech community. It was a joint initiative between the Mayor’s Office of Media and Entertainment, the Department of Information Technology and Telecommunications (DoITT), and General Assembly.
“I’m absolutely thrilled. I’m just so thankful to all the participants that gave their time, to all the technology partners, to all of individuals across the city of New York that made this possible,” said Chief Digital Officer Rachel Sterne.
The redesign of NYC.gov is part of the Roadmap for the Digital City, an initiative by NYC Digital, in the form of a 62-page report released in the spring that aims to reinvent the way citizens access, view, and use the city’s digital resources.
NYC.gov received 202 million hits in 2010. With 30 million unique visitors, the site is competing with Central Park—in a digital sense. Sterne said that a website with such a large visitor base should receive as much attention and care to accommodate the digital visitors as Central Park does to accommodate its visitors.
“When you’re thinking about physical spaces, it’s so apparent: You need to nurture them every day, you need to care for them and have stewards, and need to be investing in them and improving them constantly so they’re relevant to the lives of the people that use them,” noted Sterne.
The design of the current NYC.gov website has remained unchanged for several years. Competition participants were provided traffic analytics data to create more usable and accessible versions of the website, basing updates on the popularity of certain pages and resources.
The major issue with the current website, as pointed out by contestants, is that the top 10 resources accessed by visitors are absent from the website’s home page. In addition, according to most presenters, the current search feature is defunct.
Designers and developers worked all through Saturday, some staying as late as 1 a.m., and returned at 8 a.m. on Sunday to finish their projects. A panel of judges, including representatives from DoITT, NYC & Company, New York City Economic Development Corporation (NYCEDC), the Mayor’s Office, and members of the city’s startup and tech community distributed prizes in several categories.
“It’s been very fun—a very rewarding experience, exciting, too. It’s great to see the variety of solutions that were presented, all the creativity on display, different ways of understanding the problems with the current NYC.gov,” said Kyle Gach, 26.
Gach and his team came all the way from Manhattan, Kan., to participate in the event. The team created a visual update for the website, as well as a dashboard for mobile users.
“It was very collaborative. As a whole event, it didn’t feel like it was super competitive. It really felt like in the end our ideas could be put together,” said Raven Keller, 24.
The winners of the competition are not awarded contracts. The city is using this first in a series of events to gather ideas and approaches for relaunching NYC.gov. According to Sterne, the process is currently in the beginning stages.
“When you’re thinking about physical spaces, it’s so apparent: You need to nurture them every day, you need to care for them and have stewards, and need to be investing in them and improving them constantly so they’re relevant to the lives of the people that use them,” noted Sterne.
The design of the current NYC.gov website has remained unchanged for several years. Competition participants were provided traffic analytics data to create more usable and accessible versions of the website, basing updates on the popularity of certain pages and resources.
The major issue with the current website, as pointed out by contestants, is that the top 10 resources accessed by visitors are absent from the website’s home page. In addition, according to most presenters, the current search feature is defunct.
Designers and developers worked all through Saturday, some staying as late as 1 a.m., and returned at 8 a.m. on Sunday to finish their projects. A panel of judges, including representatives from DoITT, NYC & Company, New York City Economic Development Corporation (NYCEDC), the Mayor’s Office, and members of the city’s startup and tech community distributed prizes in several categories.
“It’s been very fun—a very rewarding experience, exciting, too. It’s great to see the variety of solutions that were presented, all the creativity on display, different ways of understanding the problems with the current NYC.gov,” said Kyle Gach, 26.
Gach and his team came all the way from Manhattan, Kan., to participate in the event. The team created a visual update for the website, as well as a dashboard for mobile users.
“It was very collaborative. As a whole event, it didn’t feel like it was super competitive. It really felt like in the end our ideas could be put together,” said Raven Keller, 24.
The winners of the competition are not awarded contracts. The city is using this first in a series of events to gather ideas and approaches for relaunching NYC.gov. According to Sterne, the process is currently in the beginning stages.
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